


The Shape of Your Name

by notsodarling



Series: flickers of light [2]
Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Gen, Handwavey Alien Science, Kid Fic, M/M, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-18
Updated: 2021-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-27 15:54:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30125205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notsodarling/pseuds/notsodarling
Summary: Michael tries to get his bearings, and Alex meets his time-traveling daughter from the future.
Relationships: Michael Guerin/Alex Manes
Series: flickers of light [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2217039
Comments: 37
Kudos: 62





	The Shape of Your Name

**Author's Note:**

> This is everyone's fault who enjoyed the first part and left me such amazing comments about writing more. I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> Title from "closure" by Taylor Swfit
> 
> <3

His time traveling daughter has his curly hair, Alex's eyes and a stubborn attitude. It's an impossible combination to show up in one person, but he's an alien from another planet, so perhaps anything _is_ possible. It causes Michael a bit of panic as they drive across town to Max's house - he needs some sort of reinforcements and with Alex not due home for at least a couple more hours, his next option is his siblings. **  
**

"Where are we?" Deia asks as he cuts the engine, and she peers out the window toward the house.

"It's - don't you know?"

She rolls his eyes, and Michael sighs, more audibly than he means to. Does he grow some sort of infinite patience over the next decade?

"I know it's not home."

Inside, Max is sitting at his desk, a notebook open in front of him, and a smile that quickly changes to confusion as Deia follows. Michael shakes his head, and closes the door as Deia stays near him, eyeing the room, and Michael realizes it's because it's unfamiliar to her. He'd brought her somewhere he was comfortable, but stuck her somewhere she wasn't. _Fuck_.

"Michael?"

"Long story," he immediately replies, trying to figure out the right words. "This is Deia. Deia this is-"

"Uncle Max, I know. I'm not stupid." Her eyes are roaming over the entire room, taking in the books, the couch, the doorways, the hallway. It takes a moment before she's pushing past him, dropping the backpack she'd brought with her on the couch, and walking straight into the kitchen.

" _Uncle?_ " Max asks, frown on his face, looking back and forth between them.

"It's been a fucking weird afternoon."

"Yeah, I got that," Max laughs. "But who is she?" 

"Showed up in my workshop this afternoon and said Alex sent her. From fourteen years in the future."

"The future - like time travel?"

Michael nods. "I mean, we're aliens. Is time travel really that much of a stretch?"

He watches as Deia fills a glass of water in the kitchen at the sink, takes a clipped shut bag of potato chips from the counter, and walks back into the living room, sitting down on the couch and pulling a laptop out of her backpack. 

"You said Alex sent her, but Michael _who is she_?"

Right. He hasn't actually answered that question.

"She said she's my daughter."

Max smiles, pushing against him with his shoulder and a laugh.

"Makes sense - she looks like you." Max pauses, his attention pulled as Deia gets to work typing away furiously on the keys of her computer, her brow furrowed deep in concentration. The sight makes something in Michael's chest go tight because besides the curls, she doesn't look like him at all. Right now, sitting on Max's sofa, computer in hand, her focus set on the task in front of her, she only reminds him of Alex. Her outfit - a hoodie, cuffed jeans, and black boots that look like the same style Alex wears only make it more obvious to him. She's pulled her curls back into a ponytail, out of her face as she works, and there's something there as well - the faintest reminder of someone else.

"She looks like Alex," he replies finally, wishing Alex was here right now. Wishing he wasn't at work and they could figure this out together.

"You think she's telling the truth?"

Michael sighs. He hasn't really considered she could be lying. Not with her attitude reminding him of himself, or with her outfit and looks reminding him of Alex. There's too many similarities, too many coincidences for her not to be related to him. He just doesn't understand the _how_. How is it possible to have taken his DNA and Alex's DNA and created a whole new human being that was so distinctly _theirs_.

Perhaps that's a question for Liz.

"She looks like Alex, Max. I can't-" he pauses, running fingers through his hair, his own frustration over the lack of answers building. "I want to be skeptical but-"

"Hey! It's okay," Max replies, interrupting his stuttering, and Michael is grateful. "Where is he? Alex?"

"Work. Telling him over the phone what was going on…"

Max nods, understandingly, but it doesn't make Michael feel any better.

As if on cue from his pocket, his cell phone vibrates with a new text message, and Michael retrieves the offending piece of technology. He hates it, and only agrees to have a cell phone because Isobel requested that she be able to get in touch with him. He'd been helpless to say no to her, even though he'd liked having it more and more lately - giving Maria a way to contact him, allowing him to reach out to Alex as the revelations surrounding his mother's time between the crash and Caulfield unraveled. 

> **From Alex:** Max's house? Everything ok?

Michael frowns at the notification - what is Alex replying to? He hasn't sent anything telling Alex where he is. He'd been planning on either leaving before Alex left work so they'd be home when he got there, or texting him closer to when Alex was supposed to be leaving. Which wasn't supposed to be for another hour.

He unlocks the screen and navigates to his text messaging app, opening up his ongoing conversation with Alex. There, right above Alex's text is a text he'd supposedly sent asking Alex meet him at Max's house.

Michael immediately looks over at Deia, who's sporting one hell of a smirk. "You hacked my phone?"

"I need to talk to dad."

Next to him, Max is smiling, and Michael pushes down the desire to punch him. He's trying to remain calm over this entire thing, and at least he's got Max for backup at the moment, but he can feel his nerves working back up again, trying to understand what is going on. Especially whatever happens fourteen years in the future that has Alex sending her back to him for her own safety.

When Alex finally arrives less than an hour later, meaning he'd left work immediately after receiving the text, Michael is sitting outside in front of the firepit, Max has retreated into his office, and Deia is now curled up on the sofa, reading something she'd picked out of Max's massive collection of books. 

There's concern and relief etched onto Alex's face as soon as they make eye contact as Alex parks the car. And Michael doesn't wait, doesn't know what's going to happen after they step inside, so he stands up and immediately closes the space between them, taking Alex's face in his hands and kissing him. After a moment, he leans their foreheads together but doesn't move away. For all he knows, this will cause another rift between them, and Michael doesn't know if, after all the work they've put in to being together, his own heart could withstand watching Alex walk away again.

"Hey, it's - what's going on?"

One more press of their lips together, and Michael pulls away enough to quickly glances through the window toward where Deia is sitting. She isn't looking at them, still engrossed in her book.

"Something happened today. Something weird-"

Alex frowns, as he follows Michael's line of sight, obviously trying to make sense of it.

"Are you okay?"

The question is so direct Michael can't even decide how to answer it. Is he okay? He doesn't know. Deia isn't something he's prepared for at the moment, regardless of how much he's always wanted kids with Alex. This is different.

"I don't know."

They sit down on the wicker furniture, sides pressed together, and Michael tries to focus on Alex instead. For the first time all day, he feels unfocused and unsure of what's going to happen. 

"Tell me what happened," Alex starts, before frowning. "And why we're at Max's house."

So he does. From his mundane work day to the impromptu nap he'd decided to take, to the overwhelming feeling of something being wrong, to the white light and dimensional portal and Deia. And as he speaks, he tries to catalog each reaction that shows on Alex's face, the furrow of his brow, a twitch of a smile in the corner of his lips.

"Can I see her?"

It's such a simple question, and Michael nods, moving to stand up but Alex reaches out, keeping him seated. Micheal glances back at him in confusion before Alex is leaning forward, pressing their lips together again. He feels himself melt into the contact, the stress and uncertainty of today fading into the background, Alex's touch grounding him to the moment. It's a relief, that Alex is curious, that he's going to meet her. 

That they will be able to figure this out together.

They head inside, Alex going first and stopping short in his steps the moment Deia lifts her head up to greet them and look at them. And that's when it dawns on him, the remaining familiarity in Deia's features, why they look so familiar to him.

_Maria._

He wonders if Alex is realizing it too, if that's what made him stop walking. Can he see how closely she resembles all three of them? Is that what he's reacting to? The realization has Michael's mind back into overdrive about the possibilities regarding DNA - how is it that on top of having features from both he and Alex, Deia also looks like Maria? A perfect composite of the three of them.

"Dad!" Deia exclaims immediately, jumping up and rushing over to him, throwing her arms around him in a hug, similar to how she'd hugged him earlier in his workshop. Michael watches as Deia takes Alex's hand in hers and places something in it - small enough that he can't see, but obvious enough that it's happening. As she steps back, far enough away to give him space, they watch as he stares down at his hand, palm open with the item Deia had pressed into it.

It's a guitar pick, Michael sees. But what's the significance?

"Where did you get this?" Alex asks, and Michael can hear the shock in his voice as his gaze remains focused on the pick.

"You gave it to me, before I came here. Said you might have trouble believing me - who I was."

Michael watches Alex nod, before reaching into the pocket of his jeans, fingers emerging holding onto something that he drops onto his palm next to the pick from Deia.

Another guitar pick.

"What's going on?" Michael asks, feeling lost. He's too far away to see the two picks closely, but from where he's standing, it almost appears as though the two are identical.

"Dad knew you might not believe me. Who I was. Because of the time travel." Deia reaches out, taking the one that had been in Alex's palm that she'd placed there, and holds it between her fingers. "A way to show who I was. Something that he would immediately understand."

"A guitar pick?"

Alex nods, closing his fist, and pulling it against his chest.

"I didn't allow myself to dream of a future," Alex begins, looking over at him, eyes glossy. "I wanted to. And I wanted some way to feel connected to you even when I was on the other side of the planet."

He holds out his hand, palm open, but Michael is too focused on Alex, on the unshed tears in his eyes, the shakiness of his voice as he speaks. 

"Alex-"

"We're here now," is his immediate reply, and Michael nods, even though it doesn't cover all the things he wants to say, the words currently lodged in his throat. Instead he finally breaks eye contact, leaning forward to get a closer look at the pick. There, roughly scratched into the plastic, is a name.

Michael feels weak in the knees, and his chest tightens as he stares back up at Alex, but his heart, hell his entire body, is filled with nothing but love for him in that moment. He'd never doubted that Alex loved him, never in the many years of their push and pull, back and forth. Those feelings themselves were never the problem between them, it was everything else that got in the way and complicated things. 

"I've never shown it to anyone," Alex continues as he closes his fist, returning the pick to his pocket, and turning to Deia.

"That's why I didn't show papa."

It's as though that's all Alex needs to accept what is happening. There's a slight change to his demeanor, his shoulders visibly relax, the forehead crease that's been present since the moment Michael saw him get out of his car is gone, and Michael finds that he's _slightly_ jealous that their time-traveling daughter is the reason for it.

"Michael said you told him I sent you because of the Alighting?"

Deia nods, jerking her head towards where she's left her backpack and laptop. "I can show you."

He watches as Alex and Deia move to the couch, as she opens up her laptop, and starts rapidly talking, her hands flying occasionally over the keyboard as she speaks, showing Alex something to further help along in the story. But Michael stays where he is, still digesting what just happened, this new little bit of information he's learned about Alex. That through everything, all the fights and the leaving, and the distance, Alex has never given up on them.

He knows the guitar pick is back in Alex's pocket, and he'll have to wait until later to get his hands on it, but the words - the name - are etched into his mind, reminding him, giving him hope.

_Alex Guerin_

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
